ESXi

Hi guys,

1) I know that for VMware Essential Plus is licensed up to 3 Host Max and 192GB per RAM. But what is the vRAM Pool if I only use 2 host, will it still be allocated to 192GB of RAM?

2) If I use Vsphere 5 Standard License, I will be only entitled 32GB of vRAM pool for one License? Which means if I buy 2 License, I will have up to 64GB of vRAM pool?

3) Is the maximum amount of VRAM allocated to a VM 96GB? What happens if I purchased 2 License of Enterprise Plus. Willl it be 1TB?

Welcome to the Community -

1) I know that for VMware Essential Plus is licensed up to 3 Host Max and 192GB per RAM. But what is the vRAM Pool if I only use 2 host, will it still be allocated to 192GB of RAM?

The vRAM entitlement is assigned by ESXi licenses so if you only deploy two hosts and I assume with two CPUs each - you will have 32 GB x 4 or 128 GB of vRAM entitlement

2) If I use Vsphere 5 Standard License, I will be only entitled 32GB of vRAM pool for one License? Which means if I buy 2 License, I will have up to 64GB of vRAM pool?

That is correct -

3) Is the maximum amount of VRAM allocated to a VM 96GB? What happens if I purchased 2 License of Enterprise Plus. Willl it be 1TB?

In calculating the vRAM entitlement the max a VM can take is 96 GB so if with enterprise plus if you had a VM with 1 TB it would still only take 96 GB vRAM out of the netitled pool of vRAM -

1) I know that for VMware Essential Plus is licensed up to 3 Host Max and 192GB per RAM. But what is the vRAM Pool if I only use 2 host, will it still be allocated to 192GB of RAM?

This is correct as you get a vRAM Entitlement of 32GB x 6 VMware vSphere Essentials CPU licenses that come in the kit.  Assuming you apply the remaining licenses to your hosts.  You can essentially just layer licenses on a host to increase your entitlement.

2) If I use Vsphere 5 Standard License, I will be only entitled 32GB of vRAM pool for one License? Which means if I buy 2 License, I will have up to 64GB of vRAM pool?

A license equates to a physical CPU.  If you have dual proc servers then each server requires 2 licenses which gives you 64GB for each host.

3) Is the maximum amount of VRAM allocated to a VM 96GB? What happens if I purchased 2 License of Enterprise Plus. Willl it be 1TB?

The maximum for any license level for allocation of vRAM to a VM is 1TB in vSphere 5.

Here is a few links to help you better understand:

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/vsphere_pricing.pdf

http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vsphere5/r50/vsphere-50-configuration-maximums.pdf

Message was edited by: jamesbowling for clarification

Thanks guys for the prompt reply.

So let say if I have Essential Plus, If I have 2 host with 2 CPU each, I will be entitled 2x32 x 2 =128GB of RAM.

If I have only 1 host with a single CPU, I will only get 32GB of RAM in my vRAM pool?

You are correct, your entitlement would be 64GB on each host.  And yes, if you only have 1 host with a single CPU then you would have 1 license and 32GB vRAM Entitlement.

Thanks James,

So that's pretty bad with essential Plus.

So let's say the maximum vRAM allowed will be 32GB for Essential Plus. If I want to give the maximum of 32GB RAM per VMs.

If I have 2 host, each with 2 CPU, I only can have a maximum of 2VMs in each Host.

With 2 Host, I only can have a maximum of 4 x 32GB VMs.

vRAM Entitlement is a combined total of all the ESXi hosts managed by a vCenter instance. Every entitlement is aggregated into a single pool which can be used by all virtual machines managed by vCenter.  You are correct on the maximums.

Hi James,

What do you meant by Layer the License? Do you meant with 2 Host, I can have more than 32GBx2CPUx2Server=128GB entitilement?

Before your help I always thought that Essential plus License is controller by the Vcenter which is a Vcenter Foundation which allows 192GB of Ram. I didn't know it is subjected to number of host.

In the Essentials kit you get 6 CPU license @ 32 GB of vRAM each for a total of 196 GB.   You can spread that over 3 hosts, 2 hosts or just 1.  In your case the 2 host would split the 196 GB of vRAM.

Hi Dave,

This is my understanding too, but james comments are different if you see from the post above?

He'll probably clarify what he meant, but I would take it as applying one CPU license per physical CPU, in which case you'd be limited to 32 GB per CPU (64 per host).  But as he states in another post if you're using vCenter the vRAM entitlement is pooled so you'd end of up with 6 CPU licenses for a vRAM entitlement of 192 GB.

Thanks Dave!  That was exactly where my posts were headed.  I was trying to make the understanding easier but I guess I just complicated it.

I want clarification too.

It was my understanding, that if you had one host and purchased essentials you got all the Vram of the three hosts included in the licensing.  You did not actually have to have three hosts. 

You are correct.  You can apply all of the licenses to a single host to accrue the total vRAM entitlement on a single host or if you run vCenter and have multiple hosts, no more than 3, you get a pooled vRAM entitlement of all of the licenses.  Does that make sense?

Hi James,

So in short, if you have 1 host with 1 CPU, you still get Pooled 192GB of vRAM available to all the VMS.

What about the vRAM entitlement 32GB per CPU License?

The vRAM entitlement is pooled and shared between all servers.  In this case you would add all 6 CPU licenses to vCenter and while the host would only use 1 CPU license, it would be able to use up to 192 GB of the vRAM pool.

Thanks Dave, so in short, when you purchase Essential Plus, it comes with 6 CPU License.

For 192GB vRAM allocation, you will need to add all 6 CPU license that comes with the Essential Plus into the Essential Plus Vcenter.

Yes - Essentials (and Essentials Plus) only comes as a kit with 6 CPU license and vCenter Server for Essentials.

Thanks Dave for the clarification.

So you are able to add on the Essential License up to a total of 6 license.

Since Vcenter for Essential plus controls the hard capped of 192GB of RAM. If you purchase the VCenter Standard, you will be able to remove the Capped of 192GB of RAM?

But will the Vcenter Standard accepts the Essential Plus License Keys?

Also I understand that Essential plus license only up to a Maximum of 2 CPU license per host. What happens if it is more than 2 CPU? How can the Vcenter knows and restricts that is more than 2 CPU in a Server?

vCenter Essentials is hard coded for only 6 CPU licenses, but I'm not sure if they check that a host is only using 2 CPU licenses.  Essentials (Plus) CPU licenses can only be used with vCenter Essentials so if you moved to vCenter Standard you would also have to upgrade the vSphere host licenses.

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/vsphere_pricing.pdf

See the KB article for conditions on Essentials and vRAM - kb.vmware.com/kb/2000935.